donald_of_tokyo wrote: and there will be no such case as "under a minute between detecting a threat and taking a hit" in AAW.
There is no cooperative engagement yet, so even if Crowsnest detects a target in advance, the PAAMS system is still blind and has to start from scratch when it can finally see the target.
donald_of_tokyo wrote: For me, it looks as if RN is still thinking the golden era of ASW is there, that the frigate is the hunter and SSK/SSN is the game, which was possible in 1990s.
What is there to suggest that has changed?
The RN needs blue water sub hunting capabilities first, they have the huge tasks of protecting a carrier and deterrent, as well as monitoring Russian activity with the RAF. This is not the environment the explosion in SSK's are effective within, they are simply too slow to attack a carrier group.
Nuclear development happens at a snails pace, and with no civilian application for nuclear propulsion, the technology has not developed quicker than our countermeasures. This is unlike SSK's, which benefit from many civilian applications for electric propulsion, along with quicker technology life cycles, contributing to the rapidly developing SSK's technology that is likely outpacing our countermeasures.
Because of this the ASW game is clearly very different in in coastal environments where SSK's are effective. Here the ball firmly in the SSK commanders court. In this environment the threat of ambush is realistic, and the only way the RN can counter this is with high intensity searches by aircraft.